S Korea wins half of world's shipbuilding orders

South Korean yards won half of the world's shipbuilding orders in the first half of this year, strengthening the country's dominance in the industry, the government said Tuesday.
The Ministry of Knowledge Economy and the shipbuilding industry said yards secured orders for 12.40 million compensated gross tons, or 50.6 percent of the world total.
It said overall global demand fell sharply compared to 2007 but the proportion of orders won by local companies increased.
In 2007 South Korea secured 38.9 percent of all orders placed against 37.3 percent for its main rival China. In the first half China's share dipped to 34.3 percent.
Local experts quoted by Yonhap news agency said many shipping companies that wanted to place orders with Korean yards had turned to China in the past, because of huge backlogs here.
They had started to return to Korea with the general drop in order volume.
Shipbuilding is one of the country's top five export industries with the total value of overseas sales reaching 27.68 billion dollars last year.